NO TIME FOR REGRETS ....

 

I found this rather lovely lady in a book of black and white Victorian illustrations I bought, and I'd meant to do a page about looking back ... or even something to do with the life in retirement I HOPED we'd very soon be having.

So that's where I was mentally headed when I laid down simple paint and the image - I can't seem to manage or even contemplate creating anything very fancy at the moment!  Too much happening what with getting ready to move in two weeks and Himself beginning chemotherapy for bladder cancer tomorrow.

A bit of collage in toning pinky/purple shades helped fill the page up a bit, and I added a black outline with a Posca paint pen and a grey shadow using a marker.  Its amazing how much difference such a simple technique like that makes.

But then I veered away from thinking about what might have beenand decided to get a grip on myself, because this is no time for regretting the life we'd hoped to have, or even the one we're about to leave behind.  The only way I can cope right now is by living in the present ... so I'm stamping hard on my tendency to look ahead and say "yes but what if" ....

"Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof" - can't remember who said that but it works for me right now.  So I'm working on taking life as it comes, one day at a time, and doing my damnedest to trust God for the future.  I'm also trying to be mindful of and give thanks for the love and friendship that surrounds us, and the house is full of the flowers we've been sent!

Someone commented that they were amazed I could journal through this, but actually the truth is that without journalling I'm not sure I would get through it.  This is my time out, space to reflect, a chance to scratch my creative itch, and it helps more than I can possibly say.

STRESSED ....

I don't know about you, but my art journalling is how I work things out ... and often the process of making a page brings me peace on the subject.  Perhaps its being able to acknowledge the stress which allows you to let something go, or at least the bad feelings associated with it?  Maybe its also about not wasting your precious energy on keeping down the negative emotions you daren't let out.  Whatever and however, it works for me ....

So this page began with lots of orange and yellow - sometimes happy colours for me, but not quite in this case.  Perhaps I associate it with intense emotions, good or bad?  I think in some way I needed to contain those feelings before they could overwhelm me, and that's why this page HAD to have a border around it!

I've used these jazzy stamps before - they're big and black, strong and powerful, which I like a lot.  Actually they were a complete bargain because they were an Ebay purchase, very inexpensive, and are really intended for marking clay.  I cut them up and made border stamps - and I've used them in the post below as well .... strong feelings again!

As so often, I just wrote on the page what I was feeling, in this case "I feel stressed".  Writing around in a circle reflected my state of mind too - I felt as if I was going round and round in circles.  Having written like that, I realised what I was doing was pointless - that I might be beating myself to death against something I was more or less powerless to change.  Maybe you know that feeling?

It seemed to me that I had some choices - to waste energy stressing about the things I couldn't change, or to decide to calmly accept.  Not easy, but I'm working on it.  What I can do is gradually enact small changes which make my life a little bit easier in the meantime, and I'm working on that.

The "hope" part - another cheapy stamp found in a bargain box - is perhaps the key word here. You have to have hope that somewhere, somehow things will change/improve, as it may be the only lifeline you have.   The Brave Girls Club of whom I'm an enthusiastic and grateful member, tell us to  "go where the peace is", and that we can choose to find that place.  My peaceful place is in the knowledge that the situation we're in won't last for ever ....

If you're another Brave Girl feeling stressed out about something, write it down to work it out!  Then draw and/or paint all over it and through that process find your peace - it works, I promise!